Bob Cohn, co-founder of PR firm BCW’s predecessor Cohn & Wolfe, passed away on July 4 at the age of 88 years.
Cohn & Wolfe became part of WPP in 2000, when the holding company acquired Y&R.
WPP merged Cohn & Wolfe and Burson-Marsteller into BCW in 2018.
In an obituary on BCW’s website, the agency noted, “For this big, bold, colorful, one-of-a-kind personality to transition from this life with a bang on the 4th of July was only fitting.”
Cohn co-founded Cohn & Wolfe with Norman Wolfe 1970 in Atlanta. Wolfe died aged 87 in 2014. It was the same year Wolfe and Cohn sold the firm to Young & Rubicam.
In a tweet, WPP said,
We send our heartfelt condolences to Bob Cohn’s family and the entire team at @BCWGlobal. As Co-Founder of Cohn & Wolfe, Bob was known for his dynamism, creativity & storytelling. He was truly one-of-a-kind.
Read more about Bob’s life & his legacy here: https://t.co/3SFjZw7Cxa
— WPP (@WPP) July 11, 2023
Tributes poured in.
Bob Cohn, 88, built one of the world’s largest PR firms https://t.co/OPlj0OQ81t
— Atlanta Journal-Constitution (@ajc) July 7, 2023
A celebration of Bob Cohn’s long and impactful life will be held in Barge Commons at The Westminster Schools in Atlanta on Saturday, August 5 at 11 a.m.
In lieu of flowers, please direct donations to Hospice of West Alabama, 3851 Loop Road, Tuscaloosa— Mitch Leff (@MitchLeffPR) July 7, 2023
Cohn & Wolfe had in its fold Coca-Cola, FedEx, Chick-fil-A and Portman Holdings.
Before foraying into PR, Cohn was a journalist. When he was 17, he enlisted in the U.S. Air Force, serving as an information officer. While studying communications at the University of Alabama, where he was editor-in-chief of student newspaper The Crimson White. He eventually became Atlanta bureau chief for several newspapers.
Cohn earned 14 news writing accolades from the Associated Press and United Press International and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in photography.
The BCW obit added, “A celebration of Bob’s long and impactful life will be held in Barge Commons at The Westminster Schools in Atlanta on Saturday, August 5 at 11 a.m. In lieu of flowers for those inclined to memorialize Bob with a charitable donation, contributions are appreciated to Hospice of West Alabama, 3851 Loop Road, Tuscaloosa, AL 35404.”
